Katharine C. Pope

Katharine Pope, MA, D-ABMDI was a Forensic Investigator and Anthropologist in Texas, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, and DMORT before joining the NamUs program in 2019 and RTI in 2021. Ms. Pope's career investigating missing and unidentified persons began after she received a postgraduate fellowship as a WWII Casualty Analyst with the Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office. She is Chair for the Society of Forensic Anthropologists and a Fellow of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences. She helped create, host, and implement practitioner trainings and discussions on topics important to the Forensic Anthropology community, such as methods accuracy, standard reporting in forensic intelligence databases, ancestry estimation, and ethical treatment of human remains. She is also passionate about creating resilient investigators and mental health support for forensic professionals.